This is a question to the blog clinic from Elsie (not her real name), who is a landlord in England.
Our small letting agent, who has no Terms and Conditions for landlords, behaved so appallingly recently with our rental income that we terminated him/her.
A new, professional agent has taken over the management of our 2 rented flats. In the absence of T&Cs, are we legally obliged to pay monthly letting fees/commission for the remaining of the rental periods to the previous one?
Answer
Its a bit difficult to answer this question as you don’t give any details of what the appalling behaviour was!
However, whatever their terms and conditions are, all businesses providing a service need to comply with the Consumer Rights Act 2015 s49. This provides that services must be performed ‘with reasonable care and skill’.
I am assuming here that you can be classed as a ‘consumer’ ie you are not a professional landlord and do not own your properties through a limited company.
The sort of things which put agents in breach of the Consumer Rights Act are failing to pay the rent to you, failing to protect the deposit, not keeping you informed of serious issues, etc.
For serious breaches you are entitled to end the contract with immediate effect, no matter what termination clauses are in your contract.
However, if you do not have a contract, then it is arguable that there are no termination clauses to bind you, so you are entitled to cancel anyway!
Probably the best thing is just to refuse to pay and see what they do. If they have behaved appallingly they are unlikely to challenge this through the courts as they would be likely to fail.
If they do threaten court proceedings, you could write and say that, so far as you are aware, you are entitled to cancel their contract due to their failure to perform their duties with reasonable care and skill in breach of section 49 of the Consumer Rights Act 2015.
Go on to say that if they bring a claim against you, you reserve the right to defend and counterclaim for damages due to their appalling service, and, moreover, reserve the right to refer to your letter on the question of costs.
However, I would suggest you try to obtain some legal advice before sending any letter just to check that the problems you experienced are sufficient to allow you to cancel their contract without notice.
Find out more
A good way to obtain advice is via our solicitor’s telephone advice service, which will allow you to speak to a specialist landlord and tenant solicitor for £130. We also have a special guide on Landlord Law for landlords who experience problems with their letting agents.